And Life in Me is What You Give
by freeze1
Summary: Susan has a nightmare while Peter is away. PeterxSusan.


A/N: I actually had a lot of fun with this! It was one of those writing barriers I swore I'd never cross, because I always considered it "icky". (At one point, yaoi was on my "icky" list. How things have changed). Anyways, remember, "in Narnia, no one thinks the worse of you for that". xD Oh, how I adore Peter.

Disclaimer: The Pevensies are the property of C.S. Lewis, who is far more brilliant than myself.

Warnings: Incest! Very mild, though.

**And Life in Me is What You Give**

_Then seek not, sweet, the "If" and "Why"  
I love you now until I die.  
For I must love because I live  
And life in me is what you give._

_Because She Would Ask Me Why I Loved Her,_

_Christopher Brennan_

Susan dreams in jerky images, crisp and grey and cloaked in silence. Faceless armies collide on the jagged edges of an old picture frame; jet-black blood spatters over tarnished chain-mail. A feeble figure eclipses the sun, and she recognizes it to be Edmund. She calls to him, but he does not hear, does not falter in his stony gaze. Before she can call again, he vanishes in a hasty whisper of the wind.

A pack of wolves claw at her ankles, her wrists, her shoulders. More stalk across the horizon, and she feels nothing but knows the end is near. Beside her lies a fallen soldier, mud-swept and broken with patterns of crusty tears across his face. She screams, frantic, noiseless shrieks, but Peter never stirs. Never.

Susan wakes to the haunting gloom of midnight, sitting rigid in her bed and breathing in short, gulping breaths. After counting to ten, a system she found to be a better stress-reliever before entering Narnia, she is unable to loosen her grip on the bedspread. Her heart pounds violently, threatening to crack her frame. Tonight, she can not slither into her slippers and slink past Peter's bedroom door, waiting in the shadows until she catches sight of the steady rise and fall of his chest before turning back. Tonight, Peter is exploring the full length of Narnia for the first time as part of a week-long expedition.

She shuts her eyes tightly as the bed spins in dizzy ellipses. It takes a moment to realize that the object she is clutching is her horn, and even longer to comprehend that in all her worry, she had used it.

It is not thirty seconds before the door to her chambers flies open and Lucy runs in, her nightdress flapping wildly about her little bare feet. She shouts something Susan cannot decipher and runs to the bed, placing her candle on the nearby table and pressing her head against her sister's. Edmund appears seconds later, shoulders drawn and lips pulled into a tight line. He stands by the door as Lucy fusses over Susan, sliding her aside as gently as possible and clambering in beside her.

"I'm sorry," Susan mumbles, for it is the first thing she can think of to say. Lucy tightens her embrace. "I had a nightmare, that's all."

She manages a shaky smile, one that Edmund does not return. If anything, his hawkeyed stare only deepens. Sweat plasters clumps of hair to his furrowed brow, and her heart falls, for she was handling her role as the eldest present so poorly.

"You two don't have to stay. I'm sorry to have woken you, but I'm fine now, really." Even as she speaks, Lucy is coaxing her head down onto the pillow and curling up beside her.

"I'll go tell the guards not to worry," Edmund says without missing a beat. And though Susan wishes she could be braver, she is profoundly grateful.

Yellow light floods her chambers when Susan awakens the following morning, clutching a sleeping Lucy to her chest. At first, her heart floods with gratitude before nearly erupting with embarrassment, and she quickly wakes her sister with the reminder that their presence is required in the throne room. She dresses hastily while a groggy Lucy watches her from the bed, explaining that Edmund is already there.

"He offered to go alone so that you could sleep in!" Lucy nearly whines. "And, really, that's a grand favor, since I doubt he got very much sleep in that chair!"

Susan, who thought her younger brother had spent the night in his own room, holds back a sob at the sight of Edmund's worn slippers resting beside her armchair.

Later that day, Susan sits by her window and watches the sun start to paint the afternoon sky. Despite Edmund's orders, she had made an appearance in the throne room and startled all the dignitaries, including Edmund himself, by racing towards him and smothering him in a hug. Edmund, looking painfully uncomfortable, quickly wiggled out of her embrace, but she caught the slight curve of his smile and had to hug him all over again.

She often wonders about Edmund, about whether or not his fate would have unfolded differently had she put more trust in him. She admits to herself that before the wardrobe, she saw her younger brother as a nuisance more than anything else, and that knowledge burns away at her heart. She wishes Peter would allow her to accept some of the blame for Edmund's actions.

The horn still rests on the wooden table beside the bed, and she can't bring herself to look at it for fear that she will be compelled to blow it again. Although thankful that it had brought Lucy and Edmund to her side, Susan feels the horn call to her, as though frustrated about not fulfilling its original purpose. She stands, moving to hide the slender object deep in her dresser drawer, out of sight.

Peter won't be returning for days, after all.

The door flies open, giving Susan quite a start. The horn slips through trembling fingers and she whirls about to face her intruder. Her heart stops.

Peter stands framed in the doorway, his chest heaving with shaky breaths, knuckles clenched white around the grip of his sword. His blonde hair is darkened with sweat and earth, his clothing is tattered and his eyes are a sharp, cold blue. His expression is both pained and murderous, and she watches as his jaw unclenches slightly at the sight of her.

For a moment, neither speaks.

"Are you alright?" Peter asks, his voice a strangled whisper. Frantic eyes dart between her face, her clothes, her hair, and all she can bring herself to do is stare at him, open-mouthed and blank. Finally, his eyes rest on her hers, and his expression grows stronger, fiercer.

"Susan, I asked you a question!" He is loud, and she it startles her, tugs her back from a dream.

"Yes!" She huffs, haughty for no reason she can decipher. "Yes, of course I'm alright! Why, I…why would you think otherwise?"

Peter's sword clambers to the ground and with three purposeful steps he strides toward her, rigid and impassioned and emblazoned with overwhelming, indescribable emotion. He stops before her just as abruptly as he started, and stands inches away as though there was a river between them and he has not the strength to breach it.

Her heart beats wildly, but her words are gentle, controlled. "I had a nightmare. I was frightened. Lucy and Edmund were here, and it was fine."

"You've had nightmares before," he says, and she momentarily wonders how he could know, if he has seen her tiptoeing past his room in Narnia's murky twilight.

"Yes," she answers steadily, "but never while you were away."

Peter's face changes, then. The sharp lines of anger fade, replaced first by surprise and then by tremendous grief that floods his pale skin and causes his lips to tremble and eyes to soften. Susan's heart breaks a little.

Swiftly, she crosses the river between them.

Her head fits perfectly in the dimple of his shoulder, the warm skin of his neck pulled flush against her cheek. His arms wrap around her waist quickly, eagerly, full of need and want as they crush her against his chest. He trembles, twining coarse fingers through her hair, and her eyes begin to water, for she does not feel she can bear to see Peter cry alone.

"I heard the horn," he whispered, breath hitched.

She tightened her grip on his tunic. "How? Peter, you were miles away."

He swallowed. "I don't care, I heard it, and I came back. I thought…" He breaks off, and in that moment Susan knows that he, too, has had his share of nightmares.

"Don't…" she starts, stopping in realization that there is no way to appropriately word such a request. She merely squeezes him tighter, and he nods vigorously.

"I won't. I won't leave you ever again, Susan. Ever."

They stand that way until long after the sun sinks below the horizon. He kisses her hair every so often, gently, furiously, brotherly and yet, somehow, not brotherly at all.

It is a few years before High King Peter departs through the gates of Cair Paravel without Queen Susan by his side. When he does leave on a short journey, Narnia becomes accustomed to finding King Edmund alone on his throne the next morning. When High King Peter returns, Narnia watches fondly as he runs to Queen Susan and kisses her, watches as glistening tears streak her cheeks. And, the night after the High King's return, Narnia ignores the absence of the two elder Majesties from the throne room the next day and the small, rusty lock on King Peter's bedroom door.


End file.
